


Phineas Nigellus Black

by unspeakable3



Series: Christmas with the Blacks [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Black Family Drama (Harry Potter), Black Family-centric (Harry Potter), Christmas, Christmas Morning, Christmas at Hogwarts, Ficlet, Ficlet Collection, Gen, Hogwarts, Prompt Fic, Prompt Fill, The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, Wordcount: 1.000-3.000, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-04
Updated: 2019-12-04
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:55:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21674056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unspeakable3/pseuds/unspeakable3
Summary: Whoever came up with such a ludicrous idea as grandchildren?
Relationships: Phineas Nigellus Black/Ursula Flint Black
Series: Christmas with the Blacks [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1560991
Kudos: 10





	Phineas Nigellus Black

_Christmas Day, 1907. Scottish Highlands._

It was Christmas morning and the snow had been falling heavily overnight, blanketing the castle and grounds in its soft embrace. The leaded windows were almost entirely obscured by snow and ice, but if one squinted one could just about make out the brightly coloured flags of the Quidditch stands.

Phineas Nigellus Black did not squint out of his windows.

Phineas Nigellus Black lay under his bedclothes, hugging his almost-cold copper bed warmer to his chest. He had the idea that if he stayed very still and very quiet, his interfering wife might just forget that he existed. Or, with better luck, assume that he had gone and died of hypothermia in this blasted castle.

That would teach them all, wouldn’t it? To have this foolish farce of a festivity marred forevermore by his death; to have them all forced to remember his _greatness,_ his _majesty_ , every time they pulled a cracker or hung a star on the tree.

_Ha!_

Perhaps they would make a tradition of carrying his portrait down to the Great Hall for Christmas lunch. Perhaps they would prop him up on the table to watch as the cretinous children bowed their heads in respectful silence and mourned the loss of their magnificent Headmaster Black.

Yes, that would do _very_ nicely.

“Phineas Nigellus! Are you awake?!”

He hissed at the sound of his wife’s mewling voice and yanked the bedcovers right over his head.

“Phineas Nigellus! It is past mid-morning you lazy lump!”

He puffed out his cheeks. _Well_. She had some cheek to label _him_ a lump. _Her_ waistline was expanding at a rate previously inconceivable to wizardkind. But then again, he supposed, that was the risk one took when marrying a Flint. He should have taken his sister’s advice and gone for the Avery girl.

There was a loud _pop!_ and the tell-tale pitter-patter of bare feet on the floorboards. Phineas Nigellus lay very still and held his breath. He heard a sniff, and a rustling, and to his great indignation felt his bedcovers being lifted. He grabbed at them, tried to hold them down, but the stupid old elf was quite insistent. There was a terrible rush of cold air; he scowled at it and snatched the covers back.

“Mistress Ursula insists that you partake of breakfast, Sir.”

“Tell _Mistress Ursula_ to eat it herself. I’m sure she can manage to fit another bowl of porridge somewhere beneath those gelatinous folds she calls a stomach.”

“Breakfast is not porridge, Sir. It is Christmas Day.”

“Yes I know that,” he snapped. “I don’t care. Go away.”

“Mistress Ursula ordered Croker to make sure that Sir gets out of bed, Sir.”

“I’ll have my sister behead you,” he said churlishly. “She does that, you know. All the disobedient Black elves have their heads mounted on the wall as a _warning._ ”

“Croker is not a Black elf, Sir. Croker is not a disobedient elf either, Sir.”

“Croker is a bloody nuisance,” Phineas Nigellus huffed. “Very well! Fetch my slippers and let’s get this damned farce over and done with.”

He muttered mutinously under his breath as he descended the spiral staircase that led to the Headmaster’s private dining room. His whale of a wife was sat already feasting, clearly having given up on her manners at some point in the last thirty-five years of their marriage.

He greeted her with a grunt and fell heavily into the tall chair at the head of the table.

“The children and grandchildren wish their Papa a very merry Christmas,” said Ursula around mouthfuls of honey-roasted ham.

Phineas Nigellus grunted. _Grandchildren_. Whoever came up with such a ludicrous idea as _grandchildren?_ As if raising one load of idiots wasn’t punishment enough, he was now expected to take an interest in his own children’s children. Modern society was headed down the bloody pipes.

“Will you be joining us for Christmas luncheon?” she asked.

“No,” he replied bluntly. “I will be expected at the feast here.”

He had informed his staff that he would be returning to London for the occasion, of course. But he was planning to hole himself up in his study with a bottle of old Ogden’s finest and work his way through that stack of philosophical treatises that he had been _trying_ to read all year. Damned children, thwarting him at every turn, expecting him to _listen to their problems_.

Perhaps he’d light a cigar or two. It was Christmas, after all.

“Isn’t the Hogwarts feast in the evening?”

“No.” _Was it?_

“I see,” she said, and patted at her wobbling cheeks with her linen napkin. Phineas Nigellus’s lip curled at the thought of the huge quantities of grease that must get caught up in all those folds of skin. “Perhaps you might join us for a game of whist tonight, then? Sirius was very much looking forward to seeing you.”

He sniffed. It wouldn’t be completely terrible to see his eldest son - Sirius was a good sort, very capable - but he would no doubt drag his dull wife and their three brats along with them. Arcturus was a terribly precocious child. Lycoris reminded him too much of his _other_ sister, with those eyes. And the other one was a mewling _baby_. No good ever came of looking at a _baby_.

“I oughtn’t stray too far from the castle,” he said. “Perhaps Sirius could meet me at the Hog’s Head if he is so eager to see his father.”

“I hardly think Hogwarts is going to collapse if you visit London for an hour or two.”

“I take my duties as Headmaster very seriously, _dear_ ,” he sniped. “Even if you do not.”

“Very well,” she sighed, and rose from the table with great effort. Her heaving bosoms wobbled like two enormous blancmanges and made Phineas Nigellus feel quite nauseous. “Enjoy your festive luncheon with Armando and the other children.”

Phineas Nigellus Black wasn’t permitted his quiet Christmas in the solitude of his office after all. His busybody of a wife had ordered that damned elf to check that he made it safely down to the Great Hall for luncheon - the only gift he’d be asking for _next_ year would be its head in a box. Perhaps he would hide it in Ursula’s bed or shove it in her stockings.

He wasn’t even offered the dignity of his usual seat at the high table. No - in the spirit of _Christmas_ , _someone_ had decided to eschew all propriety and mix staff with students, regardless of house or rank. He had been stuck between a snotty first year Hufflepuff and a Ravenclaw bore, who talked his ear off about her father’s promotion in the Ministry as if he cared one _jot_ about such mundanity.

His Deputy Head, Dippy Dippet, sat opposite him and kept announcing that the hat from his Christmas cracker - a replica of Marie Antoinette’s ship wig - had slipped off his head again. Phineas Nigellus growled every time, but Dippy didn’t seem to understand that he was pushing it off _on purpose_.

And then, in the Hog’s Head when Phineas Nigellus thought he had found _peace at last,_ bloody Sirius had the gall to remind him that his eldest grandson would be starting school in a few years and wouldn’t _that_ be lovely?

No, child. It most certainly would _not_.

**Author's Note:**

> Phineas Nigellus Black (1847-1925) became Hogwarts' least popular Headmaster and loathed his profession. He married Ursula Flint and together they had five children: Sirius, Phineas, Cygnus, Belvina, and Arcturus.


End file.
